it's all of a sudden an issue because the admin isn't releasing it. they are doing this to themselves. moreover, bush campaigned on their ability to prevent terrorism/the better choice for security reasons, bush himelf cited to the report last year when it was favorable as evidence that the iraq invasion was having the intended effect of stemming terrorist attacks around the world. it appears this report, to some degree, would cut against the assertions that the war on terror is going in our favor.

but again, it's not about the content. it's the principal and the pattern at issue. the report either isn't favorable(objectively speaking) or could be construed by many as not being favorable and thus it gets buried. that's horrible policy in an allegedly transparent democracy.

if the report is flawed or doesn't present things favorable to the admin, then release it, and say why things are still going fine. give the context. don't just hide it.

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f/k/a mclamb6

"What is the public doing with this report?"

Keeping themselves informed about the world around them.

"How many headlines in the past 19 years has this report made?"

What difference does that make? Only reports that make headlines are important?

"The everday US citizen doesn't pay attention to this report. Why then is it all of the sudden an issue?"

The avergae US citizen doesn't pay much attention to public education funding, or the World Health Organization, or any number of other things. that doesn't mean they aren't important.

The DoS is responsible to put together a "full and complete annual report" about the global terrorism trends. To me that would have to include statistics, and for DoS to say that they don't think this should be their job anymore is not kosher. If this information keeps flowing from DoS to the Congress, then it seems they are meeting their legal requirements. However, if they are simply pawning it off on another agency, then it would seem they are not. Additionally, when your bread and butter issue is the Global War on Terrorism, and that's what got you re-elected to the Presidency, it's not unreasonable for the people who elected you to expect to be kept informed about the progress of that endeavor. If the one report you make public is suddenly yanked, and if the reason for that is that the report doesn't support your rhetoric, then that's a problem.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

obviously, the primary goal is protecting our own. a secondary goal is ending/slowing attacks worldwide. it's rare that doing one won't help the other, at least with respect to international terrorism. so success, to me, would be a downward trend in both(of course, protecting our own being more important). bush himself used the report, which, prior to revision, showed attacks were down. so the number of attacks was relevant to his definition of success when the report was on his side. now that it's not, let's bury it.

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f/k/a mclamb6

Heard this on right wing radio this morning.

The reason the report was quashed was that the definition of a "terrorist act" was changed to inlude many more incidents thus making it appear that more incidents have occured.

Don't know if is true or not. Just passing on what I heard.

I don't see it as an issue.

The report is being published, just not the sanitized version to the public. Congress and those who need to know are being informed.

I think it's a good move.

"The report is being published, just not the sanitized version to the public. Congress and those who need to know are being informed"

The law requires the Sec of State to publish the report as much as practicable in an unclassified form, and allows classified appendices. If they aren't doing that, it's a problem.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

"The reason the report was quashed was that the definition of a "terrorist act" was changed to inlude many more incidents thus making it appear that more incidents have occured."

The definitions are laid out in the law, so unless the law has been changed, the definitions shouldn't have changed any.

"the term “terrorism” means premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents" - US CODE 2656f(d)

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

Are you saying they should have elimiated the unclassified version prior to this year? If so, why?

It's not accurate and instills a panic among the public.

Anyways, what does the public do with the information? Nothing....so why publish it if all it does is makes the newscasters sensationalize and worry people unneedlessly?

then explain to me why dubya can cite to it when it shows him in a favorable light? the report is kosher when it shows things are ok, but not so hot when it shows terrorist attacks increasing, is that it? or is dubya so much wiser than reagan, his dad, and clinton and even himself(from 2001-2004) to realize it would worry our little heads to much and so we are better off not knowing?

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f/k/a mclamb6

How can they use it if it is never published?

Absolute gray area there. It is strictly up to the interpreter to determine whether an attack is politically motivated. It is also usually open to interpretation as to who is responsible for an attack. Most go unclaimed while others have many groups that take responsibility for them.

In other words it is up to our intelligence experts(?) to interpret this data. I think we can agree that their track record in the last few years has been less than stellar.

"Absolute gray area there"

You got a better definition? Cause almost every agency in the U.S. Govt has a different definition. Yes indeed, there is a lot of gray area when talking about terrorism.

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Slowguy

(insert pithy phrase here...)

Would you then conclude that our fight against terrorism was a success, based on your criteria above, in the years 1995 through 8/2001? As I recall, there were zero successful attacks here in that time period.

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"Go yell at an M&M"

well of course it's a malleable definition, but it hasn't changed. but more importantly, when the results of the report were in bush's favor, he had no trouble using it to crow about his successes in the w.o.t. there were revisions and a spike in the numbers of attacks and suddenly it's unreliable...

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f/k/a mclamb6

I would say there was no real fight on terror until 2001. I don't think any but a small group thought it could or would actually happen here and by the time people figured out an attack was imminent it was too late to piece it all together.

My point is what is the grading scale for being a success? Unfortunately, we don't know we missed something until the attack has happened. Is the W O T successful here at home? Today it is because there have been no attacks, but that would all change if we got hit tomorrow and we could then see all the simple things we missed leading to the attack like we did after 9/11.

How can you be so sure that it has not changed? The data is open to the biases of the people/persons interpreting the data. If those people have changed or if their beliefs or data gathering tactics have changed the interpretation of the data could also have changed.

I agree that the Bush admin is chicken@#$% for not allowing the report to be published but I would like an explanation as to the "revisions". It would also be fair to review all data for previous report year data with the current standards of interpretation.

how can i be so sure? see slowguy's response. maybe the people are interpreting it differently, but there is no indication the definition itself has changed. the admin certainly never said anything like that.

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f/k/a mclamb6

That is my point.